That night, James tried to ask Remus about it.

"It's nothing," Remus said sharply. His voice quavered slightly, but that was the end of the discussion. No one pushed it.

Rather than worrying about schoolwork, the boys spent most of their time planning pranks, not only on Umbridge, but on the school.

By the middle of December, the boys had earned a total of fifty seven detentions. James had twenty, Sirius twenty-six, Peter had eleven, and Remus none.

"Your turn to plan something," Sirius told Remus.

"I can't, my mum's sick again," Remus said.

"When are you leaving?"

"After dinner."

"Ah."

James glanced at the clock. "Well, fifteen minutes plus dinner isn't much time to plan an elaborate prank."

Remus nodded.

"Er, I hope your mum gets better," Peter said.

"Uh, yeah. Thanks," Remus said distractedly.

After dinner, Remus left the boys in the Gryffindor Common Room.

"Bye!" Peter called after him.

"He disappears a lot," Sirius noted.

"His mum's sick a lot," Peter pointed out.

"James' mum was sick last year and Dumbledore didn't let him skip."

"He also comes back from his mum's all bloodied up," James said quietly. "I met his parents at Kings Cross, they're too nice to do anything like that."

Sirius hesitated, then said even more quietly, "Do you get the feeling he isn't telling us something? Like something important?"

"Yeah, he's not a great liar," James said.

"I trust Remus-" Peter started.

"I trust him, too," James said. "And I also agree with Sirius."

Peter shifted uneasily. "Well, I guess-"

"Do you notice how he tenses up when we ask him what he does when he leaves?" Sirius asked. "I'm worried about him. Whatever he does, he comes back hurt from it and doesn't talk about it. That's not like him. I mean, last year he ranted for a week about that homework assignment from Binns."

"That was you," Peter told him.

"It was nine days of you complaining about how History of Magic is mandatory," James remembered.

"That's not the point. The point is, something is up with him and I'd like to figure out what," Sirius said.

"You know, it's really not our business, if he doesn't want to tell us, he doesn't have to," Peter said.

"Yeah," James decided, "but we're his friends, and friends are there for each other. How can we be there for him if we don't know how?"

Peter sighed. "Alright. How do we start?"